Tiltable converter

ABSTRACT

The invention relates to a tiltable converter with a carrying ring surrounding at least part of the converter jacket and supporting the converter by carrying means which take up the bearing and tilting forces, said carrying means consisting of annular bearing lugs into which the carrying bodies extend. The annular bearing lugs and the carrying bodies are connected by means of flange connections arranged at a distance from the converter jacket, so that between the flange connections and the converter jacket a hollow space is formed. Thus, the screw connection is easily accessible for tightening the screws, the carrying bodies are not overheated and the thermal expansibility is not disturbed.

[451 Aug. 27, 1974 TILTABLE CONVERTER Peter Moser, Linz-Dornach, Austria Prima'y Examiner-Gerald Dost Attorney, Agent, or Firm-Brumbaugh, Graves, Donohue & Raymond Inventor:

[73] Assignee: Vereinigte Osterreichische Eisenund Stahlwerke Aktiengesellschaft, Linz, Austria ABSTRACT [22] Filed: Mar. 8, 1973 The invention relates to a tiltable converter with a carrying ring surrounding at least part of the converter [21] Appl' 339302 jacket and supporting the converter by carrying means which take up the bearing and tiltin g forces, said car- [30] Foreign Application Priority Data rying means consisting of annular bearing lugs into Mar. 15, 1972 Austria which the Carrying bodies extend- The ann ular bearing lugs and the carrying bodies are connect of flange connections arranged at a dista converter jacket, so that between the flan tions and the converter jacket a hollo formed. Thus, the screw connection is ea ble for tightening the screws, the can not overheated and the thermal ex disturbed.

POP 5 NNMw cm .6 m m m MA "mm 10.. "U" CS mm E I T n WA mm rT r a m D m RE L 1 W 0 urn .w UhF U 1 "M r LUU U 3,635,458 1/1972 Puhringer.......................... 266/36 P 0 3,652,071 3/1972 266/36 P 5 Claims, 6 Drawing Figures TILTABLE CONVERTER The invention relates to a tiltable converter with a carrying ring surrounding at least part of the converter jacket and supporting the converter by carrying means which absorb the pressure and tilting forces.

It is known to construct the carrying means as angular pairs of claws, the flange or shield of the claw turned towards the converter jacket being screwed to the converter jacket and the projecting flange being screwed to the carrying ring. In order to obtain at the brick work side of the metal jacket an inner contour which is as smooth as possible, it is necessary to sink the fixing screws in the converter jacket, for which purpose sunk head screws are used. In this kind of claw connection the bending moments are conveyed by the screw connection into the metal jacket. For absorbing the radial stresses one or more shearing elements must be provided. It has shown that this kind of carrying means has various faults. Thus, it is, e.g., impossible to maintain the necessary pretensions in the screws for a longer period of time. Owing to the form of the screw heads and the high temperatures which occur in the jacket the screw heads will set so that the pretension will gradually be lost. Thus, the screwing of the claws has to be controlled continuously so that the screws may be tightened when necessary. Hence the servicing costs are unusually high. Moreover it is difficult to get at the claw screws and the work itself is rather dangerous as there may easily be accidents.

According to the Belgian Pat. No. 671 634 carrying means are known in which the carrying bodies are formed as axle journals connected with the converter jacket, which extend into annular bearing bushes of the carrying ring. It is difflcult to secure these axle journals and a tire-shaped auxiliary carrying ring has to be used for this purpose. It is a further disadvantage that the axle journals get hotter than the bearing bushes of the carrying ring which surround the journals so that jamming may result and the bearings may be damaged. In this known construction the thermal stress and deformation of the converter vessel is by no means taken into account.

A further carrying construction with bearing lugs has become known from the French Pat. No. l 348 175 in which the carrying means are constructed as a plurality of bearing lugs which are arranged to lie radially in one plane and connected with the converter wall, and into which bolts extend which are connected with the carrying ring. Owing to the plurality of the suspension points it is not possible to calculate in the static condition the stresses and forces exerted on the converter and complicated adaptation and fitting in operations are necessary. Also, the problem of the free thermal expansibility of the converter vessel is not solved owing to the plurality of the bearing lugs and bearing bolts; in normal operation, e.g., during tapping, the converter is irregularly heated and thus irregularly deformed, so that jamming is unavoidable.

The invention is aimed at avoiding the described disadvantages and difficulties. In a converter with a carrying ring surrounding at least part of the converter jacket and supporting the converter by carrying means which absorb the pressure and tilting forces, said carrying means consisting of annular bearing lugs into which the carrying bodies extend, the invention resides in that the annular bearing lugs and the carrying bodies are connected by means of flange connections arranged at a distance from the converter jacket, so that between the flange connections and the converter jacket a hollow space is formed.

Compared to the known claw flange connections this construction has the advantage that instead of the inadvantageous sunk head screws normal expansion screws may be used which guarantee a remaining and uniform pretension. Further, the screw connection is easily accessible from both sides of the flanges.

Compared to the known carrying constructions with bearing lugs and carrying bodies extending into them the construction according to the invention has the advantage that owing to the hollow space between the flange connections and the converter jacket the carrying bodies are not overheated and the thermal expansibility is not disturbed.

Further features of the construction according to the invention reside in that the annular bearing lugs are connected with the converter jacket via ribs arranged in stellar fashion without, however, themselves being in contact with the converter jacket. As a safety means against torsion of the carrying bodies they may be provided with noses which extend into recesses in the annular bearing lugs,

A preferred embodiment of the construction according to the invention resides in that some, preferably three carrying means staggered to each other by comprising annular bearing lugs and carrying bodies extending into them are arranged around the circumference of the converter and the converter is rotatable in the carrying ring so that the supporting places of the carrying means may be changed. This change is very simple since the exchange of planar flanges causes no difficulties and little fitting work is needed.

In order that the invention may be more fully understood, an embodiment thereof shall now be described with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a front view, and

FIG. 2 is a plan view of a converter having an open, horseshoe shaped carrying ring.

FIG. 3 shows a lateral view of a carrying means, and

FIG. 4 is a sectional view along the line IV-IV of FIG. 3.

FIGS. 5 and 6 illustrate the manner in which the converter may be rotated.

In the drawings numeral 1 denotes the converter vessel, which is surrounded by a carrying ring 2. As may be derived from FIG. 2 the carrying ring is designed as a horse-shoe shaped carrying ring. The carrying ring is provided with rotation and tilting trunnions (not shown). The carrying means according to the invention comprises the annular bearing lugs 3 which are connected with, e.g., welded to, the converter jacket 1 by means of ribs 4 which have a stellar arrangement. As may be seen in detail from FIG. 4 these annular bearing lugs 3 have an angular cross section, i.e., they comprise a flange 5 which extends in parallel to the converter jacket 1, and the flange 5' which projects at right angles from the converter jacket. This flange 5' which projects at right angles from the converter jacket is connected with the ribs 4 and thus via these ribs with the converter jacket 1.

The carrying body 6 has a hollow conically formed foot part 7 to which a trunnion 8 is joined. The foot part is provided with an accentric ring-shaped part 9 and an annular flange 10 which is flatly apposed to the annular flange 5 of the part 3 of the carrying means. The flanges 5 and are penetrated by bores for receiving the screws 11 which are tightened by means of nuts 12 so that the carrying body 6 is tightly connected with the bearing lug. Numeral l3 denotes shims. As a safety means against torsion a nose 14 is provided on the foot part 7 of the carrying body, which nose extends into a recess of the ring 3 via wedges 15. The nose and the transverse bar 16 are penetrated by a screw 17; by tightening the nuts 18 an adjustment without play is possible. Between the flange connections and the converter jacket the hollow space 19 remains free which has a heat insulating function.

FIG. 5 shows on exaggerated scale a converter vessel 1 which was deformed by thermal influences and has thus obtained an oval or elliptical form, whose longitudinal axis lies in the tilting plane. These thermal influences may be caused, e.g., by non-uniform wear of the brick work and by the heat radiating from the casting ladle during tapping. In order to counteract such deformation the vessel must be rotated in time so that supporting places are continuously changed. The position of the vessel shown in FIG. 5 in which the carrying means are denoted with 3,3,3 and lie on the supporting places 20,20,20" has been changed in FIG. 6 by rotation in the clock-wise sense so that the carrying means 3 comes to lie on the bearing place 20', the carrying means 3 on the supporting place 20" and the carrying means 3" on the bearing place 20 of the carrying ring. In this manner the wear may be rendered more uniform and a permanent deformation is avoided.

What I claim is:

1. A tiltable converter assembly comprising a converter,

a carrying ring surrounding at least part of the converter,

a plurality of carrying means positioned on the converter for taking up the bearing and tilting forces of the converter, each carrying means comprising a plurality of ribs connected to the converter and an annular bearing lug connected to the plurality of ribs in such a way that a predetermined distance exists between the annular bearing lug and the converter, each annular bearing lug having a flanged portion, plurality of carrying bodies having one end supported on the carrying ring, each of the carrying bodies having a flanged portion at the other end mating with the flanged portion of one of the annular bearing lugs, the mating flanged portions of the carrying bodies and the annular bearing lugs being located at such a distance from the converter that a hollow space is formed between the carrying bodies and the converter, and fastening means for securely fastening the carrying bodies to the annular bearing lugs, the hollow spaces formed between the carrying bodies and the converter being wide enough to receive at least one part of the fastening means and to provide heat insulation of the carrying bodies from the converter.

2. The converter set forth in claim 1, wherein the annular bearing lugs are connected with the converter jacket via ribs arranged in stellar fashion, without, however, themselves being in contact with the converter jacket.

3. A tiltable converter assembly having a safety means to protect against torsion forces, comprising a converter, 7

a carrying ring surrounding at least part of the converter,

a plurality of carrying means positioned on the converter for taking up the bearing and tilting forces of the converter, each carrying means comprising a plurality of ribs connected to the converter and an annular bearing lug connected to the plurality of ribs in such a way that a predetermined distance exists between the annular bearing lugs and the converter, each annular bearing lug having a flanged portion and a recess,

a plurality of carrying bodies having one end supported on the carrying ring, each of the carrying bodies having a flanged portion at the other end mating with the flanged portion of one of the annular bearing lugs and a nose which extends into and mates with said recess in said one of the bearing lugs, the mating flanged portions of the carrying bodies and the annular bearing lugs being located at such a distance from the converter that a hollow space is formed between the carrying bodies and the converter, and

fastening means for securely fastening the carrying bodies to the annular bearing lugs, the hollow spaces formed between the carrying bodies and the converter being wide enough to receive at least one part of the fastening means and to provide heat insulation of the carrying bodies from the converter.

4. The converter set forth in claim 1 wherein the plurality of carrying means and carrying bodies are arranged at equally spaced points around the circumference of the converter so that the converter is rotatable in the carrying ring and the carrying bodies may be arranged at different supporting places on the carrying ring to restore the converters round shape after thermal deformation.

5. The converter set forth in claim 4, wherein three carrying means are used which are staggered to each other by 222 3? UNITED STATES PATENT OFFI CE CERTIFICATE OF CORRECTION Patent No. 3,831,917 Dated Aug. 27, 1974 lnventofls) Peter Moser It is certified that error appears in the aboveidentified patent and that said Letters Patent are hereby corrected as shown below:

First page, Item [73] "Vereinigte Osterreichische Eisenund Stahlwerke Aktiengesellschaft" should be --Vereinig.te

(isterreichische Eisen und Stahlwerke Alpine lMontan Aktiengesellschaft.

Signed and sealed this 10th day of December 1974.

h (SEAL) Attest:

MCCOY M. GIBSON JR. C. MARSHALL DANN Attesting Officer Commissioner of Patents 

1. A tiltable converter assembly comprising a converter, a carrying ring surrounding at least part of the converter, a plurality of carrying means positioned on the converter for taking up the bearing and tilting forces of the converter, each carrying means comprising a plurality of ribs connected to the converter and an annular bearing lug connected to the plurality of ribs in such a way that a predetermined distance exists between the annular bearing lug and the converter, each annular bearing lug having a flanged portion, a plurality of carrying bodies having one end supported on the carrying ring, each of the carrying bodies having a flanged portion at the other end mating with the flanged portion of one of the annular bearing lugs, the mating flanged portions of the carrying bodies and the annular bearing lugs being located at such a distance from the converter that a hollow space is formed between the carrying bodies and the converter, and fastening means for securely fastening the carrying bodies to the annular bearing lugs, the hollow spaces formed between the carrying bodies and the converter being wide enough to receive at least one part of the fastening means and to provide heat insulation of the carrying bodies from the converter.
 2. The converter set forth in claim 1, wherein the annular bearing lugs are connected with the converter jacket via ribs arranged in stellar fashion, without, however, themselves being in contact with the converter jacket.
 3. A tiltable converter assembly having a safety means to protect against torsion forces, comprising a converter, a carrying ring surrounding at least part of the converter, a plurality of carrying means positioned on the converter for taking up the bearing and tilting forces of the converter, each carrying means comprising a plurality of ribs connected to the converter and an annular bearing lug connected to the plurality of ribs in such a way that a predetermined distance exists between the annular bearing lugs and the converter, each annular bearing lug having a flanged portion and a recess, a plurality of carrying bodies having one end supported on the carrying ring, each of the carrying bodies having a flanged portion at the other end mating with the flanged portion of one of the annular bearing lugs and a nose which extends into and mates with said recess in said one of the bearing lugs, the mating flanged portions of the carrying bodies and the annular bearing lugs being located at such a distance from the converter that a hollow space is formed between the carrying bodies and the converter, and fastening means for securely fastening the carrying bodies to the annular bearing lugs, the hollow spaces formed between the carrying bodies and the converter being wide enough to receive at least one part of the fastening means and to provide heat insulation of the carrying bodies from the converter.
 4. The converter set forth in claim 1 wherein the plurality of carrying means and carrying bodies are arranged at equally spaced points around the circumference of the converter so that the converter is rotatable in the carrying ring and the carrying bodies may be arranged at different supporting places on the carrying ring to restore the converter''s round shape after thermal deformation.
 5. The converter set forth in claim 4, wherein three carrying means are used which are staggered to each other by 120*. 